Hundreds attended the funeral of A.J. Stocks, a state trooper whose vehicle was hit by a garbage truck near Wake Tech’s southern campus in 2008. Stocks, an Army and Marine veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, was later buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
But one tribute that Stocks did not receive was one that is usually bestowed upon state troopers who die in the line of duty: a bridge dedicated in his honour. He wasn’t the only one overlooked.
The State Highway Patrol concluded that 23 of its 70 personnel murdered on the job since 1929 did not get a bridge named after them. Col. Freddy Johnson Jr., the patrol’s leader, set out to correct it.
Beginning last spring, the Highway Patrol requested 23 honorary designations from the North Carolina Board of Transportation, which approved the remaining four on Thursday.
Last month, the board decided to rename the N.C. 42 bridge over Interstate 40 in Johnston County the Trooper A.J. Stocks Bridge. His widow, Liane, was present.
“A.J. was a devoted son, brother, nephew, husband, father, Marine, paramedic, soldier and trooper,” she stated to the board of directors. “His heart was big, and he lived for service. I know he is very delighted to be honoured by having this bridge named after him.”
Since the 1920s, the state has named hundreds of roads, bridges, and interchanges after persons, most of whom are politicians, business leaders, soldiers, or those slain in combat or in the line of duty.
Former Congressmen G.K. Butterfield and David Price, NBA star Steph Curry, St. Augustine’s track and field coach George Williams and long-time Johnston County broadcaster Carl Lamm are among those who have lately been honoured with a highway interchange or section named after them.
The process is not automatic; someone must request that the state Board of Transportation designate a roadway or bridge in a person’s memory, as well as offer endorsements and paperwork demonstrating why they are deserving.
Some honours came decades later.
It is unclear why the 23 Highway Patrol personnel were ignored.
Several died decades before, possibly before the tradition was started. The Smithfield Road bridge over Interstate 95 in Cumberland County was named for Patrolman Henry T. Timberlake this fall, nearly 85 years after he was killed in a crash on what was then known as the Fayetteville-Dunn Highway.
Three of the troopers honoured on Thursday died almost 75 years ago, including Patrolman Buck Fidler, who was killed in a motorcycle accident in Davidson County in 1936. Fidler was not married and had no children, and First Sgt. Joseph Leonard stated it was difficult to locate someone in his family.
But Leonard discovered a relative in Tennessee who said she not only knew about Fidler, but had recently traversed a bridge near her house dedicated to a state policeman and wondered whether such an honour had been bestowed upon him. Leonard informed her that the I-85 bridge across NC 109 in Davidson County would be named after Fidler.
“To hear the excitement in her voice was just unbelievable,” Leonard told the board. “What we’re doing today, as the state of North Carolina Department of Transportation and Highway Patrol, is extremely important to the family members of our fallen troopers and patrolmen, even if it happened in 1936.”
Terry Peacock had never seen her uncle, Patrolman Thomas B. Whatley, who was shot and killed by an intoxicated man in Graham County in 1947. But she grew up hearing stories of her father’s brother Tom, and two members of her family are named after him now.
“We so appreciate that he is being remembered,” Peacock told board members on Thursday. She choked up and said, “This means the world to our family.”
Other troops being honoured, like Stokes, died recently, so their memory is still vivid.
Officer Jackie L. Daniel, 43, was struck and murdered in 1994 while assisting a stranded driver on Interstate 85 in Mecklenburg County. The board agreed last month to name the N.C. 73 bridge over the highway in neighbouring Cabarrus County in his honour.
His daughter, Ashlyn Daniel Letourneau, told board members that her father was a quiet man who was passionate about his work and assisting people in his community.
“My family’s hope is that when others see my dad’s name on the bridge, it’s not to remember the tragedy of his death but to remember how he lived his life,” Letourneau told the crowd.
The majority of the 70 troopers who died on the job were killed in collisions, with the first six riding motorbikes. However, 21 people were shot to death, and four died in plane or helicopter crashes. Two died as a result of complications from COVID-19 contracted on the job.
“All of these men made the ultimate sacrifice for the state of North Carolina,” Colonel Johnson told the board last month. “And on behalf of all of the Highway Patrol, I want to thank you for helping us go back in time and fix this.”